Benefits of Using Microblogs

Given the amount of information on the Internet that is readily available, one can see why educators would want to take advantage.  There is potential here for teachers to benefit from microblogging, specifically with Twitter.  There are many different ways that teachers can use Twitter in their classroom, as demonstrated in the article, "28 Creative Ways Teachers Are Using Twitter."  Such benefits include: instant feedback, enabling discussion outside of class, keeping parents informed, and supplementing foreign language lessons.  Being a Spanish teacher myself, I was automatically drawn to this idea of using Twitter for a foreign language supplemental.  According to the article, the idea of teachers "Tweeting a sentence in a foreign language at the beginning of the day or class and ask students to either translate or respond in kind as a quick, relatively painless supplement" can help continue to develop the students' second language acquisition.  While nurturing their language development, I can also see how this use of Twitter for supplemental assignments would also serve as a form of instant feedback for teachers.  You would be able to see, instantaneously, whether or not your students were able to complete and/or understand the assignment.  Furthermore, to see how affective the assignment was in accomplishing some type of language goal. 

Specifically for foreign language teachers themselves, Twitter can serve as a way to easily connect with other teachers and professionals, as stated in YouTube videos on "Integrating ICT into the MFL classroom: Twitter for Teachers."  In this sense, teachers are able to get timely feedback from other teachers about lesson plans, how to use microblogging successfully in the classroom, etc...  Furthermore, it gives teachers an opportunity to ask questions about different topics in education, to continue their professional growth and development.  A network is being created, a network that can serve as a resource pool, a go-to for help, and a place to communicate and express ideas.